Electroless Tin for Printed Circuit Boards PCBs

Electroless Tin:-

In it's plain form Electroless tin is not very popular with many assembly companies. As a thin layer it quickly combines with the copper. Often within weeks of manufacture the resultant finish becomes very difficult to solder. This short life span can be increased by increasing the thickness of the tin layer. Traditionally a thicker layer was always rejected as it known to regularly result in tin whiskers forming, which given time would result in short circuits on the PCB. If used with the tin thickness in a safe range and assembled within a fast timescale, Electroless tin is a very workable finish cost effective. It also has the advantage that if the individual circuit boards are still panelised, should they be too old to assemble the panels can be reworked by stripped off and replating the tin. Follow this link for more up to date information on Tin whiskers to the NASA Goddard Tin Whisker Homepage. http://www.nepp.nasa.gov/whisker/index.html




Organic Coatings	Board Finish's